The Leak Is Not Where the Stain Is

No, and it's the first thing worth saying. We replace roofs, we don't patch them, so if what you need is a repair we'll tell you that and put you in touch with someone who does them. What we will do is find the leak for you, for free, and give you the report in writing whoever ends up doing the work. Storm and hail damage is the exception, because that runs through an insurance claim and it is work we do.

Because water travels before it drops. It comes through at the failure, runs along the underside of the decking or down a rafter until something stops it, and then falls. A stain in the middle of a bedroom ceiling routinely comes from a failure eight or ten feet up the slope, often on the other side of a wall. That's the whole reason a leak can't be diagnosed over the phone or from the ground, and the reason we start in the attic instead of on the roof.

From inside first. We trace the staining on the decking and the rafters back to where water actually entered, because that's the only thing that tells us where to look on top. Then we check the usual failure points in that area: flashing at a wall or chimney, a valley, a pipe boot, nail pops, and the ridge. Most leaks we find are a detail rather than the field of the roof, which is worth knowing because it changes what you should be asking for.

Call us and we'll tarp it, in most cases the same night. Move what's under it, put a bucket down, and if the ceiling is bulging and holding water, punch a small hole at the low point to let it drain rather than letting the drywall come down all at once. Tarping is not a repair and we don't charge it like one; it stops water entering the house so that the actual fix, ours or somebody else's, can happen on a dry roof and in daylight.

Often not, and we have no reason to pretend otherwise since a repair isn't work we take. One failure on a roof with fifteen years left is a repair and we'll say so. What points to replacement is the pattern rather than the leak: shingles at the end of their service life, damage on more than one slope, granule loss across the whole roof, or a third patch on the same roof in a few years. At that point each repair is buying months on something that is already finished.

It can be tarped in the rain and it can't be repaired in the rain. Shingles and sealant won't bond to wet decking, and a repair made on a wet roof fails and takes the next dry day's work with it. Stopping the water and fixing the roof are two separate jobs and they shouldn't wait on each other, which is why the tarp goes on the same night and the diagnosis happens after.

Flashing, more often than shingles. The places where a roof meets something else are where it fails: a chimney, a wall, a valley, a skylight curb, a pipe boot with a cracked rubber collar. Ice damming at the eaves is the DMV's seasonal version of the same thing. A roof rarely fails in the open field of shingles until it's genuinely worn out, which is exactly why the age of the roof changes what a leak means.

It depends on what caused it, and the line is sharper than most people expect. Insurance covers sudden damage from wind, hail, or a storm. It doesn't cover a roof that simply wore out, and a leak that turns out to be age is not a claim. If the inspection shows storm or hail damage we document it for your carrier, handle partial approvals, and regularly overturn denials. If it isn't a claim, we'll tell you before you file, because a denied claim on your record buys you nothing.

Yes, and there's no version of this where you owe us something. You get the diagnosis, the photos, and a written report the same day, and you keep it whether the answer is replacement, a repair we'll refer out, or nothing at all. We're only the right contractor for one of those three outcomes, and we'd rather be honest about which one you're in than talk you into the one that pays us.

You can often narrow it down, and it's worth doing before anyone comes out. Go into the attic on a bright day with a flashlight and look for daylight, dark staining on the decking, or wet insulation, and note where they are relative to the stain downstairs. What we'd ask you not to do is go up on the roof. Wet shingles are lethal, and a homeowner walking a roof to look for a leak causes more damage than the leak most of the time.